Witness: Affair led to killing

A former stripper with whom Asim Amran had an extramarital affair testified yesterday that Mr. Amran told her he killed his wife and pointed out where he said he disposed of her remains.

Rukhsara Saffa told the jury in Mr.Amran’s Worcester Superior Court murder trial that she entered into a relationship with Mr.Amran after meeting him in the fall of 2008 at the Lamplighter II strip club, where she worked under the stage name “Fantasy.”

She said she was going through a divorce at the time and Mr.Amran told her he was separated from his wife, Faiza Malik, and was planning to divorce her.

Mr. Amran, 32, formerly of 355 Summer St., Fitchburg, is on trial on a charge of first-degree murder in what authorities said was the morphine poisoning death of Ms. Malik. Her severely decomposed body was found Aug. 20, 2009, in a suitcase near Depot Road in Oxford, off Interstate 395. Police believe she was killed on or about Dec. 31, 2008.

Ms. Saffa, who has a child, said she and Mr. Amran eventually became engaged. On Dec. 31, 2008, she testified, she told Mr. Amran he would have to choose between her and his wife.

Hours later, Mr. Amran showed up at her Worcester apartment with his 3-year-old son and told her, “That’s your son. You have two kids now,” according to Ms. Saffa. She said he later told her his wife had gone to Virginia to stay with an aunt.

On Aug. 16, after she had twice been questioned by state police, Ms. Saffa said, Mr. Amran drove her to Oxford, pointed out where his wife’s body was and admitted he had killed her. She said she turned that information over to police, despite Mr. Amran’s warning that he would kill her and her family if she told anyone.

Under cross-examination by Mr. Amran’s lawyer, Kevin J. Reddington, Ms. Saffa denied that Mr. Amran called her on Dec. 31, 2008, and told her he had returned home and found his wife dead. She also denied telling Mr. Amran to take her car to dispose of the body.

In his opening statement in the case, Mr. Reddington said he expected the evidence to show that Ms. Malik, a native of Pakistan, was depressed over the deterioration of her arranged marriage to Mr. Amran and took her own life.